You can buy ALOT of "cheap" reels from grizzly and the like for the price of some of those. Although I have a few $300 shimano setups that I love dearly. But 700 to 1000...I can think of ALOT of other places that kind of money could go. But to each his own.
"But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 25:15